


Of relationships long past

by pearlAngel



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Adam & Lance (Voltron) are Siblings, Black Paladin Keith (Voltron), Black Paladin Lance (Voltron), Blue Paladin Allura (Voltron), Blue Paladin Lance (Voltron), Don't Judge Me, Getting Back Together, M/M, Multi, My First Fanfic, Red Paladin Keith (Voltron), Red Paladin Lance (Voltron), Space Dad Shiro (Voltron)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:27:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27646799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pearlAngel/pseuds/pearlAngel
Summary: Lance and Keith were in a relationship with James in the Garrison. When the Kerberos mission fails and Keith gets kicked out of the Garrison, James and Lance are in distress because no one has heard from Keith in months. Roughly a year later Lance alongside two other cadets goes missing during lockdown and is eventually declared dead. James is devastated becaus not only is Keith still missing but Lance is dead. Eventually James picks himself up and goes on to life their colective dream, go to space. Meanwhile in the castle of Lions Lance and Keith talk about their relationship and decide to try again, leaving space for James should he ever wish to return. When team Voltron records Vlogs for their loved ones back on earth Klance makes a secret Vlog, to give to Sam Holt, explaining everything to James. Now it's time to return home to earth and past relationships come to light. How will everything end? Does Veronica  know of Lance's relationship or did James keep it a secret?
Relationships: Adam/Shiro (Voltron), James Griffin/Keith/Lance (Voltron), James Griffin/Lance (Voltron), Keith/Lance (Voltron), Lance & Lance's Family (Voltron), Minor or Background Relationship(s), Sam Holt & Keith, Sam Holt & Lance
Comments: 11
Kudos: 52





	1. Mending broken bonds

**Author's Note:**

> This is just an idea that popped into my head while reading fanfiction. I may writ more to this idea if I want to (I kinda want to) or if you ask nicely. This is actually only a small part of what I have still planed for this as you might see in the summary. Anyways have fun reading.

knock, knock, knock  
“Lance … can I talk to you for a minute?” Keith asked carefully, sounding almost … scared?  
“Sure, come on in” Lance answerd Keith, surprise clear in his voice. 

Lance was surprised Keith came to talk to him, because sure, he and Keith had gotten closer, especially after Shiro disappeared, but Lance still didn't feel like he was close enough with Keith to have such private talks. And considering this seemed like a pretty sensitive topic, Lance didn’t feel right sitting here with Keith. Shiro should be here in his place, but he wasn’t about to push Keith away, when he finally seemed to open up a little.  
Admittedly, Lance still felt a little hurt and angry towards Keith for pretending to not remember Lance from the Garrison.  
Sometimes Lance wondered if Keith really had forgotten him, if all these little moments Lance had spent curled up with him and James in one of their beds watching movies or just learning together for a test. Wondered if all these moments really were for nothing and Keith really didn’t remember him and James. 

However, now was not the time to jump into that rabbit hole.

“Sooo,” Lance asked when Keith had sat down next to Lance “what did you want to talk to me about?”. “I…” Keith hesitated.  
He didn’t know. I mean sure, Keith knew what he wanted to talk to Lance about, he just didn’t know how to properly put it into words.  
“I guess I wanted to apologise to you”. Keith finally got out, still a little unsure about this conversation. 

“Apologise?” Lance questioned. “Why would you want to apologise to me?”.  
Keith hesitated for a moment before answering. “Because I acted like a total dick by pretending I didn't remember you … and James I guess?”.  
Lance raised an eyebrow at Keith “You guess?”.  
“No, I know, I’m just bad at all this feeling thing”, Keith grumbled out between his hands, which were currently hiding his bright red face.  
Lance was silent for a moment, processing the words Keith said. ”Apology accepted” Lance sighed, “Though I’m not quite ready to forgive you just yet. What you did really hurt me, okay?”.  
“Yeah that’s alright” Keith admitted, as he could imagine how much it would have hurt him, were he in Lance’s position.  
“And while we’re all coming clean now, I’ve got to admit that I remember our bonding moment” Lance mumbled into the quiet atmosphere of the room. 

Silence, before Keith exclaimed in shock “ You remember!?” voice raising at the end “ but why didn’t you say anything?”.  
“I was still hurt from your little stunt of forgetting,” Lance made air quotes with his fingers for emphasis on forgetting “who I am” voice defensive and a bit angry. A sad and slightly hurt expression took over Lance’s face, eyes shining with unshed tears, lips wobbling ever so lightly, “After our little bonding moment I wasn’t sure where we’re standing and I didn’t want to end up heartbroken again, seeing as at that moment I still thought you had forgotten everything. So I denied remembering it, trying to protect myself from any more pain”.  
Keith visibly winced at that because until now he was never aware of how much he actually hurt Lance without meaning to. “I’m sorry. I just” Keith trailed off letting out a frustrated grunt. “I know what I did is unforgivable and really hurt you and I don’t even want to think about James and how he must be feeling now. I mean we’ve been missing for months! Me even longer than you, he probably thinks we’re dead!“

Lance petted Keith sympathetically on the shoulder at that. If Lance was honest with himself he didn’t really think of that. Didn’t want to think of James and his family, all think he’s dead and knowing didn’t even get to say goodbye. Yea no thinking of that right now.

“But… after Shiro went missing and the Garrison just declared him and the crew dead, … there was just no way in my mind, that the mission failed because of some crew mistake or piloting error. I felt so lost, it was like someone pulled away the ground under my feet. I felt like freefalling, not knowing if it would ever end. It was all too much for me to handle, so I ran away like I always did when I felt like I was suffocating. And with that I hurt you both, for that I’m really, really sorry”.  
Keith took a deep breath having said all that in a rush. Lance wrapped him in a tentative hug in a try to comfort Keith, who realised only now that he was crying.  
“Hey, ssh, it’s okay, we all do stupid things once in a while” Lance gently hushed Keith who only begann to cry even harder, letting out all the tears he bottled up ever since Shiros dissapearence roughly a year ago. “The important thing is that you realised that you did something wrong and learned from it so you won’t make the same mistake twice”. 

Lance just let Keith cry himself out on his shoulder while drawing comforting circles in Keiths back waiting for him to calm down enough to speak again. “So… ,” begann Keith cautiously, unsure of how to approach the topic. “where do we go from here?”. “I’m not quite sure what you mean Keith” said Lance with a raised eyebrow. Keith grunted in frustration at having to explain his thoughts. “What I meant was, what is our relationship status, how do we stand to each other?” Keith explained.”Well… if you’re okay with it I would be willing to try again. Give it another go” Lance shrugged, trying and failing to hide how much Keith’s answer meant to him. “That’d be nice,... but what about James?” Keith questioned.  
“What about James”  
“I mean in case we ever return to earth and James hasn’t moved on. What are we gonna do then? Where would we stand with him?”  
“Easy, we could always just leave room for him should he still want to.” Lance replied casually. “Sounds good.” Keith yawned the exhaustion from crying so hard making him tired.

Lance laid down on his bed opening his arms invitingly for Keith to snuggle himself into. Keith accepted his invitation happily and promptly fell asleep in Lance’s arms. Just like that, the both of them slept soundly in each other's arms, for the first time in almost two years.


	2. A Video for James

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay,I'm finally finished. Anyway I hope you enjoy the second chapter.
> 
> Attention:  
> italics are actions  
> normal is Lance and Keith recording the Vlog  
> bold is James watching the Video

_ahem_

“Hello this is Lance paladin of the black lion”, “and Keith paladin of the red lion.” … “Why are we so formal Lance, this is just a video for James to explain everything to him” Keith frowned at Lance.

“Yeah sorry, you're right” Lance admitted. “Hi James this is Lance”, “and Keith” Keith grumbled out 

**‘God his boyfriends are idiots, two idiots he very fucking much loves’**

**James thought.**

“So,” Lance began. “I guess you want to know what happened and where we are now?”

“Well long story short we discovered a giant sentient blue Lion warship, flew to space, discovered an alien princess and her advisor and joined an intergalactic space war against evil purple cat furries” Lance deadpanned.

**“You did what now?!”**

**“Why would you do that?”**

Keith snorted from his place next to Lance. “What?” Lance asked Keith, “Is something wrong with what I said?”. “No” Keith simply answered Lance with a small smile. Lance pouted “Then why did you snort?”. “It’s just the way you said it makes it sound ridiculous” Keith replied.

**James shook his head with a fond smile gracing his lips**

**“Good to know they still bickering as usual”**

“You’re mean” Lance crossed his arms in front of his chest while sticking his bottom lip out in a childish pout. “And you’re cute” Keith comments offhandedly, which causes Lance to blush furiously, and turns his attention back towards the camera. “Since Lance apparently can’t explain things I’m going to take over”. 

“To start at the beginning, after I was kicked out of the Garrison I lived in a little shack out in the desert and found the blue lion without knowing what it was, as well as found out about an event that was to happen. This event turned out to be Shiro crashing on earth in an alien escape pod.”

“Right, so around this time me and Hunk snuck out and found Pidge on the roof fiddling with some tech that she built hersel f”. Lance butted in. “Naturally we went to investigate what the crash was -”

**“During a lockdown Lance, during a lockdown”**

“While totally ignoring a lockdown” Keith interrupted Lance. 

**“Thank you Keith”**

“Anyways,” Lance waved Keith off “on the crash site we, by that I mean Hunk, Pidge and me, found Keith rescuing Shiro, I helped and all together we fled from the Garrison on Keiths Hoverbike”. “After the escape we spent the night in Keith's shack” Lance continued “and headed out the next morning to investigate a strange outcropping in the desert, we followed the signal of an element that does not exist on earth and discovered a cave that was full of carvings of a lion.”

“Lance with his famous impulse control-”. “Hey” Lance made an offended outcry “It’s not like you are any better mister hothead Mcmullet”

**“You know Keith, Lance has a point there.”**

**“You always were the one with no impulse control”**

“As I was saying, Lance touched the markings which began to light up in a pale blue light, when suddenly the floor broke away beneath our feet and we fell into another bigger cave.”

“There sitting was the Blue Lion. Lance of course ran into the Blue Lion immediately after it opened for him”. Keith continued completely ignoring Lance’s friendly jab at him.

“The Lion spoke to me,” 

**“The Lion did what now?! Are You fucking kidding me?”**

**Honestly, James was going to grey early, because of the stress these two put him through.**

“and told me to go through a random wormhole that had appeared. On the other end we found a castle in front of which Blue landed, we went in and woke up Allura and Coran, two aliens of an ancient race that was destroyed 10 000 years ago, rescued the rest of the Lions that form Voltron and became the defenders of the Universe” 

**“Defenders of the Universe” James deadpanned.**

**“I leave you to alone for one minute and you find a mechanical lion, meet two aliens**

**of a race that has been dead for 10 000 years, discover more mechanical lions and become defenders of the universe.” James cried out slightly hysterical, voice cracking in various places. His hands gripping furiously at his hair.**

**“Hey” Kinkade placed a strong but gentle hand on James shoulder “the important thing is they’re alive”**

**“You’re right, i know, it’s just hard knowing they are out there, fighting on the frontline of a war, knowing every day could be their last. It scares me, because I'm here on earth, sitting ducks with no way to help or knowing if they're okay.”**

“Of course the story doesn’t end there, however it would take far too long to explain all the shit that happened to us out here, so we’re gonna leave that for when we’re back to earth.”

Lance finished the explanation.

“Now to get to the second and main reason why we decided to record this video, it’s time we have a talk”. You sound like a parent scolding their children” Keith commented on Lance wording. “Do you have a better idea?” Lance said, slightly annoyed at being interrupted by Keith … again. “No” Keith smirked. “Then don’t interrupt,” Lance pouted.

“What I was trying to say,” Lance picked up again “was that we need to talk about our relationship”. Lance bit his lip, unsure about what to say.

“Not too long ago Lance and I had a long overdue talk, in which we came to a conclusion about where we stand and where we go from here” Keith continued for Lance.

“The conclusion is simple, Lance and me decided to try again at a romantic relationship after a rocky restart at the beginning. We also decided that if your up to it, we would love to have you back in our arms”

“Yeah that would be nice” Lance said and if you looked close you could see a stray tear running down his cheek.

**James had to admit that he was pretty close to tears too.**

**God he missed these two idiots, his two idiots.**

“Are you okay babe?” Keith asked softly.

“Yeah, I’m fine, just got a little emotional with all this talk about going home and all” Lance admitted.

“You’re homesick again aren’t you?”

Lance just nodded softly in return trying to hold the tears in. Now was not the time to have a breakdown. Keith frowned a little but said nothing, knowing Lance would talk to him later about it.

“Just take care of yourself, I'd like to return to you being in one piece” Lance croaked out between his tears.

“See you” Lance and Keith finished in unison, turning off the camera.

**“See you too” James whispers softly, thankful for the silent comfort of the other MFE pilots.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the next chapter:  
> The paladins finally return home, secrets get exposed


	3. Of reunions and relationship talks (part one)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The third chapter is finally online. Took me long enough to finish.  
> Anyways enjoy reading.  
> small warning: swearwords
> 
> Lions and pasangers:  
> Black lion: Lance + Kaltenecker  
> Red Lion: Keith, Shiro and Cosmo  
> Blue Lion: Allura, Coran and Space mice  
> Green Lion: Pidge + fluffy space caterpillars  
> Yellow Lion: Hunk and Romelle

Lance couldn’t wait. He was practically vibrating in his pilot chair from excitement and nerves. Black was obviously amused by his excitement but tried to hide it behind her usual responsible and serious exterior. But Lance couldn’t help it, he was simply too nervous and excited to sit still.   
They were finally back on earth, well more like about to land, but still. He could finally see his family again and don’t forget James.

‘God have I missed them all’ Lance thought to himself.

Even if Earth looked different from what he remembered. More gray and lonely, … more deserted. It was a sad thought that they have been too late to protect Earth entirely from the Galra. But it wasn’t too late yet to save Earth. That thought was what counted the most.

“Lance,” said Keith, dragging out the name in fond exasperation. “I don’t need to see you to know you’re practically bouncing in your seat”.

“I’m sorry, I’m just too excited to sit still” Lance apologized.

“No need to apologize for something you can’t control, Lance” Shiro spoke up from where he was standing behind Keith, a small smile gracing his lips. “After all, we’re all excited to finally be home again”.

“Exactly” Pidge jimed in from the green Lion. 

“I can’t wait to see my Moms again.” Hunk added. 

“Oh my god,” Pidge suddenly exclaimed “I just realised. I’m sooo grounded.”

This drew a laugh from the team.

“Yeah, Yeah,“ Pidge pouted, “just you laugh at me”.

“Not to interrupt, but we’re about to land.” Lance stated, returning to seriousness. “Prepare to engage if needed”.

“Roger that team leader” Keith confirmed, with similar agreements from the rest of the team following soon after.

Thankfully they didn’t encounter more than a few stray galra, which were quickly taken care of, and could land safely. After that it didn’t take long for their pickup, in the form of the MFE pilots who were responsible for bringing the voltron pilots and companions safely to garrison grounds, to arrive and the team quickly piled into the two trucks.   
The alteans and Pidge climbed into the truck driven by Ryan and Nadia, while Lance, Keith, Hunk and Shiro followed Ina and James into the other one. 

“And who is this little guy?” James asked, referring to Cosmo, who was currently sitting next to Keith and happily wagging his tail at the attention.

“This is Cosmo, my teleporting cosmic space wolf.” Keith introduced Cosmo. Recognizing his name being said, Cosmo let out a small bark as if to say hello.

At that James lifted a questioning eyebrow.

“Long story” Shiro answered James’ silent question, while simultaneously sparing Keith from talking about something he wasn’t exactly comfortable with telling.

“Guess you have a lot of those.” James stated.

“Oh yeah, you bet” Hunk agreed. “We’ve got everything from funny to sad stories about people dying or disappearing.” 

When Hunk said the last part, Keith sent a pointed glare towards Shiro, who looked away innocently, not noticing Lance rubbing his hand over his chest right where his heart is. James noticed but decided not to say anything about it and filed away the information for later. 

“... Do I wanna know ?” James asked carefully. It was obvious that this was something Keith did not want to talk about. And however much James loved Keith, James did not want to have his head bitten off by an angry Keith. Angry Keith was a scary Keith.

“Cool your jets Keith.” Lance reprimanded Keith fondly and whacked him lightly over the head.

Keith glared at Lance a bit, before huffing out a breath and crossing his arms in front of his chest in a childish pout.

“Cute” Lance remarked, which caused Keith to blush bright red.

‘Cute indeed’ James thought to himself.

Shiro shook his head fondly at the antics of those two, while Hunk smiled at his best friend, happy, that he is happy. 

“Reaching Garrison grounds in five minutes” Nadia informed over the coms.

Before they knew it the trucks had reached the Garrison where people were already waiting to welcome the paladins.  
Immediately, Pidge launched herself into her Mothers arms, while Shiro and Keith stayed back watching the other Paladins reunite with their families and Hunk stood helplessly searching for his own missing family.  
As soon as Lance saw his family rushing towards him, he was out of the car and running to catch his niece and nephew who were nearly tripping over their feet in their haste to reach their favorite uncle. Soon after the rest of the McClain-Clan reaches Lance and they all pile themselves onto Lance happy that he is finally back with them.  
Between all the tears, apologies and welcome backs, Lance notices that one person is missing. Adam.

“Where is Adam?” Lance asks carefully, almost afraid of the answer he might get.

“Oh Lance,” his Mother begins, “your brother is in the hospital, darling.”

Lance lets out a sigh of relief. For a moment he feared that Adam was … dead.

“Why? What happened?” Lance questioned.

“A month before you came before you came, the galra attacked earth” Lance’s father began to explain.

“Adam was one of those that defended earth. Their planes were quickly shot down. Adam was the only one who survived.” Veronica finished.

“Oh, is he… is he okay?” Lance asked hesitantly, dearly hoping that Adam was alright.

“Of course hermanito, it takes more than a plane crash to take down a McClain.” Marco said, ruffling Lance’s hair. “He should be released soon. So how about you go visit him later, he will be happy to see you.”

“Okay.” Lance agreed, already thinking about what he’s gonna say. “But what about you guys?“

“We already visited him this morning, so we’ll leave you to it whenever you want.” Marco answered.

‘Looks like I’ve gotta find some company myself’ Lance thought, because he was sure he wasn’t ready to face Adam alone.

~Time skip to the hospital because I’m lazy~

When Lance, accompanied by James and Keith, reached the hospital room in which Adam currently resided in, they found that he was sleeping. This prompted the three boys to grab some of the chairs that were standing all around the room and sat down to wait for Adam to wake up. 

“Since we're currently all alone, I think now would be the perfect time to talk” Lance spoke into the silence of the room.

“To talk?” questioned James with a raised eyebrow. “About what?”

“You know, about what me and Keith said in the video” Lance explained.

“Well, if I haven’t made it clear already by willingly sitting in these uncomfortable as fuck hospital chairs, then let me make it clear. I would very much like to have you guys back.”

“Aww, great. Does that mean we can cuddle now?” Lance asked, twisting around in his chair to face James properly. 

“Yes Lance,” Keith said, drawing Lance flush against his chest, “that means we can cuddle now.” and placing his chin on Lance’s head.

Lance let out a squeak in surprise before he relaxed into Keith's hold, while simultaneously stretching out his long legs out and laying them in James’ lab. Happily making himself comfortable between his two boyfriends.

James chuckled at their antics before adding to his previous statement. “And anyways, mx life would be pretty boring without you two in it to mix it up a little.”

Lance let out an offended gasp at this, placing his right hand over his heart in a dramatic way, which caused both Keith and James to laugh out loud.

“Hey, at least I’m not as bad as Keith.” Lance tried to defend himself.

“Are you sure about that little bro?” Adam cut into the conversation with a smirk.

Lance fell out of his chair, surprised by Adam suddenly joining the conversation. Or he would have, had it not been for Keith still cradling Lance in his arms. Lance huffed something out that sounded suspiciously like ‘traitor’. Adam just laughed at his brother's offended act.

After that the four males fell into a comfortable conversation, talking a bit about what happened after the paladins left earth in the blue Lion. At some point a nurse came in to do some last checkups on Adam before deeming him okay to go home.   
When they were done with the checkout and on their way out of the hospital, Lance suddenly stopped. 

“Are you okay?” Keith asked, being the first one to notice that Lance stopped walking.

“Yeah, everything alright” Lance waved off Keith's concern. “I just wondered, do you have any place to stay for the night?” Lance asked, turning towards Keith.

Keith blinked once before he spoke up. “Now that I think about it, not really, no.” Keith shrugged “I guess I just assumed that we’ll stay at the Garrison or something”.

“Well you could always stay at my place” Lance offered. “Only if you want to of course” he hastily added, realising what he just offered.

“That would be nice, if it’s not too much of a bother.” Keith admitted, nervously scratching the back of his neck.

“Don’t worry about it” Adam reassured him. “I’m sure Mamá wouldn’t mind having a few guests. You could ask Shiro too if you want and James, you could stay as well if you want”.

“You know what, I think I’ll take you up on that offer”.

With that they made their way towards the McClain residence, picking up Shiro on the way who gladly accepted the offer to stay with Lance’s family. At the McClain house they had a big dinner before they went to bed early as Shiro advised them to, seeing as they had a meeting early the next day about the war and Earth's defences. Lance, Keith, James curled up under the covers of Lance bed. Shiro however chose to stay in one of the guestrooms of the house. Cosmo, who had stayed with Shiro for the majority of the day, chose to curl up at the foot of the bed.

That night Pidge was last seen disappearing into her room, muttering something about catching up with all the video games she missed.

Hunk, despite being invited by the McClains as well, chose to stay at the Garrison together with Allura, Coran and Romelle.


	4. Not a chapter

Attention: This is not a new chapter. I have to admitt, that i have hit kind of a dead end in this chapter. To help me get inspired i've decided to ask you, my dear readers for help.  
How you can help? Easy. All you need to do, is post your ideas for the following scene, in the comments of this not-Chapter.

The scene:  
A game of truth or dare with these characters:

Keith  
Lance  
Pidge  
Hunk  
Shiro  
Allura  
Coran  
Romelle

Matt

Adam  
Veronica  
James Griffin  
Ina Leifsdottir  
Nadia Rizavi  
Ryan Kinkade

Cosmo  
Spacemice  
Space catterpillars (those weird aliens from the trash planet)

All ideas that are chosen, will of course be given credit for their help.   
Thanks for your help <3


	5. Of reunions and relationship talks (part two)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally finished this bad boy, let you wait long enough, so enjoy!  
> Also, this chapter is partly inspired by the “surviving space with your ex-fiancé'' series by subtlehysteria on ao3. Honestly you should read it, it’s really good.

the next morning

“Lance, get up” Veronica said, knocking on the door to Lance’s room.

A groan came from the other side of the door. Bed sheets rustled for a moment, then … nothing, silence.

“Lance, I swear to god,” Veronica threatened “if you don’t get up right now, I will set Nadia and Sylvio on you”.

“Nooooo.” came Lance’s answering groan, from where he was comfortably lying, cuddled between Keith and James.

Veronica tried one more time to persuade Lance to get up. For nothing Lance, as always, was too lazy and stubborn to get up in the morning.

Lance, Keith and James lay there for a few more minutes in comfortable silence, just enjoying each other's presence, before deciding to get up. ...Well James and Keith decided to get up, while Lance still stayed in bed, refusing to get up. James and Keith shared a meaningful look, portraying a lot of things, but one thing was clear. Lance would not be in bed anymore by the time they were done with him.   
With a nod and similar devilish grins, they grabbed Lance by his hands and feet respectively and hauled him out of bed, placing him on his bedroom floor. 

Cosmo watched curiously, wondering about what was going on. 

Lance looked up with a pout and sent his boyfriends, who were leaning over him with their lips still pulled into a grin, a betrayed look. Since he was already awake and the warmth of his bed gone, Lance decided that he might as well get dressed now.  
Once they had all put on their uniforms and were ready for the day they began their descent down towards the kitchen.

By the time they came downstairs, almost everyone was already assembled at the breakfast table, all in various stages of awake, a cup of fresh, hot coffee in most of their hands or standing somewhere close by.

“Oh look, he lives.” Marco teased Lance as he trudged into the kitchen.

“Har ,har ,har, very funny” Lance grumbled out, still slightly miffed about being woken up so early.

“I have to admit, I’m surprised to see you awake so early.” Adam admitted, coming out of the kitchen with a cup of coffee in his right hand.

“I was dragged out of bed” Lance mumbled into his own cup of coffee.

“He means literally.” Keith sent a smirk towards Lance over the rim of his own coffee mug.

“Ooooh, I wanna hear the story of that” Rache said, rubbing her hands together at the thought of more black mail material.

“Don’t you even dare think about it.” Lance exclaimed, while pointing his fork intently at both James and Keith.

They just raised their hands innocently, sharing a look that said they’d tell that story later.

Shiro raised a questioning eyebrow at their interaction, but put it off as just good friends teasing each other. It was too early in the morning to think about deeper meanings.

“Okay, okay,” Lance's father clapped his hands. “you’ve teased your brother enough for today. Also, I believe you’ve got a meeting to get to. So hopp hopp, off you go.” He commented, ushering everyone that attended the meeting out of the house.

~at the meeting~

Simply to say, the meeting was tiring. Not only was it boring as hell, he didn’t get half of what was said, technical stuff simply wasn’t his field of expertise, but also nerve grating, since some of the higher ranking officers simply held no respect for Lance.  
Saying things like, he was too lazy to actually take up the responsibility of being a leader or that he was too childish to be a good leader or best of all, that the black lion obviously made a mistake by choosing Lance as the leader of Voltron.   
Black wouldn’t choose an irresponsible idiot as her paladin and his Mamá certainly didn’t raise one. Thank you very much.

However, Lance didn’t have much time to get himself worked up over the idiocy of some people, because Team Voltron (Adam included) and the MFE-Pilots, Lance thinks this might be because of James, since he didn’t know the MFE-Pilots all that well, were quick to defend him and change the topic to more important matter.

After that, the meeting went by rather peacefully, with the occasional jab at one of the voltron pilots, so they could discuss how best to defend Earth from any galra attacks and how to liberate Earth from the clutches of the galra.

Least to say, at the end of the meeting Lance was ready to punch someone in the face.   
‘God Keith was really rubbing off on him’ Lance thought, accompanied by a mental chuckle from Black. Apparently, Red was very proud of her for training her former paladin so well. This however did not stop him from feeling like punching something or someone.  
And if the rest of the team was anything to go by, they weren’t feeling much better than Lance. 

Allura was currently involved in a heated discussion about something, if Lance had to take a guess he would say it was about the simple disrespect of those humans and Shiro just looked done and about ready to die and Hunk, sweet, sweet Hunk looked like he was debating between making sure no one would do something stupid and bashing someones had in for daring to insult his best friend.

Adam was stopping Veronica from doing something impulsive, McClains were very protective of their family, and looked about as done with life as Shiro, Pidge was repeatedly bangin her head on the table and Keith looked like he was ready to stab someone.

The MFE-Pilots were standing in their own little corner, where a smirking Nadia and bemused looking Ina were watching an unimpressed Ryan holding a very irritated James back by his shoulder.

They were all very high strung with emotions right now and if they didn’t want to snap at every second person they met that day, they all seriously needed to kick back and relax. How very lucky Lance had just the idea of how to help.

“Hey guys” Lance spoke out loud, catching the attention of everyone left in the room.  
“Since this meeting went so wonderful,” damn the sarcasm was high on this one “ and we’re all a little stressed out, I propose a small activity to help us relax a little.” Lance said with a smirk on his face.

“What would that activity be?” Shiro asked carefully, not sure yet if he will like this idea.

“Well, I thought of a game of truth or dare” Lance proposed. 

This drew a cheer from most of the occupants of the room, while the alteans just looked confused and Shiro still looked uncertain, but was quickly convinced by the others.

“So how about we all meet back here at 4 a.m.” Adam suggested, the others nodded in agreement, “I’ll give you the location later”.

With that the rest left in small groups or alone, each going off to do their own things.

~later that evening~

As they had previously discussed, everyone met at the location Adam had sent to them.  
Said location was, what appeared to be, an old, rarely used meeting room with only a handful of chairs and a lonely desk in the middle of the room.

Once everyone had arrived, they made quick work of the few pieces of furniture decorating the room, by pushing them against the wall, so they could settle in a loose circle in the middle of the room.

James, Keith and Lance sat down with their backs facing the door, with Keith in the middle.  
To the left of James sat Ryan, followed by Nadia and Ina.   
Veronica sat in between the MFE- Pilots and Adam, who together with Shiro sat almost opposite of Keith.   
To the direct opposite of Keith sat Coran, with Allura and Romelle to the right of him.  
Hunk sat to the left of Lance and the Holt siblings, Matt had landed on earth today, were situated in between the Alteans and Hunk.

The paladins, of course, were accompanied by their animal friends, which they had mostly made in space. The space mice were currently sitting on Alluras shoulders and playing with her hair. Cosmo had made himself comfortable between Lance and Keith, with his head in Keith’s lap. Pidge’s space caterpillars, Newt and Leo, were nestled in her hair and hidden from sight. Matt had a lap full of dog, seeing as the siblings could convince their parents to let them take the family dog, Bae Bae, with them.

“So” Adam began, looking around the room, watching each of the occupants for a few seconds, before moving to the next one. “Who wants to beginn?”

“Oh, oh, I wanna.” Lance said, bouncing up and down in excitement.  
“Keith, truth or dare?”

“Truth?” answered Keith hesitantly. He did not trust the smirk Lance was wearing.

“What did you say when I asked you about Cosmo’s name?”

“I told you he was gonna tell me his name when he was ready” Keith frowned. He didn’t understand what was wrong with that. It was perfectly reasonable.

This earned Keith a chuckle from most of the people assembled in the room.

“Shiro, truth or dare” Keith questioned his brother, once the others had calmed down. 

“Dare” Shiro decided. Knowing that no matter what he chose, Keith would make it embarrassing for him.  
“I dare you to tell us about the day Adam proposed to you,” Keith rubbed his hands in evil anticipation. this story will never grow old, even though he heard it a thousand times.

So, with a heavy sign, Shiro began telling the story of his engagement to Adam.  
“The day started as always. I was woken up in the morning, by Adam telling me to get my lazy ass out of bed”.  
“We had a free day so we had no classes to teach and no meetings to attend, because of which we were free to do as we please. After a good breakfast of pancakes, courtesy of Adam, we visited all the places that held memories of important steps in our relationship.  
At the end of the day he finally proposed to me and I was so flustered I didn’t know what to say and ended up thanking him,” Shiro admitted, hiding his bright red face in his hands.

“Cute” Adam commented, giving Shiro a light peck on the temple.

“Adam”

“I’ll go with dare”

“Tell us an embarrassing childhood story” Shiro challenged.

‘Of course’ Adam thought, what else was Shiro gonna choose. But well, if Adam was going down, he wasn’t gonna go down alone. He searched through his phone memory until he found the perfect video. Adam protcasted the Video onto a big screen, so everyone could see.

As soon as Lance recognized the Video he groaned, hiding his face in his hands.  
“Why Adam, why. Of all the things you could have chosen”.

“Suck it up hermano. This is as embarrassing for me as it is for you”.

Veronica just sent Adam her best death glare as response to the video.

In the video Ada, and Lance were dressed up as their respective twin, honestly Adam didn’t remember why, and the same was for Veronica and Rachel. This meant that both he and Lance were wearing skirts. Not only for one photo though, they had for some reason decided to switch roles for one day, this included names, behaviour and clothing. Their parents had naturally filmed the whole ordeal eagerly. Since they were still relatively young then, both boys didn’t seem to have too much of a problem with what they’re wearing. 

Most of the occupants of the room, excluding the McClain siblings who were lying in embarrassed puddles on the floor, seemed to be enthusiastically soaking up the events playing in front of them on the screen, occasionally laughing when something particularly funny happened. 

“Keith”

Keith decided to go with truth. He did not trust Adam with a dare.

“Okay, who was your crush at the garrison?” Adam had wanted to know for ages, but could never get Keith to say his name.

Keith looked at Lance and James, silently asking for permission. He would not tell anything they weren’t comfortable with telling. Both gave him a nod in conformation, which you wouldn’t notice, weren’t you deliberately looking for it. Nadia gave them a thumbs up to show the support of the rest of the MFE pilots.

“Well, that depends on which one you mean.” Keith answered Adams' question with a smirk.

“There was more than one?” Adam asked flabbergast.

“There were two to be exact” Keith leaned back on his hands, grinning.

“That actually explains a lot, now that I think about it,” Shiro commented, tapping his left pointer finger against his chin. There were always minimal inconsistencies when Adam got Keith to talk about his crush, which wasn’t often to be honest.

“You can’t just leave it at that, now we gotta know who they were,” Pidge exclaimed in excitement. All the while, Bae Bae was wagging his tail in response to his owner’s excitement and Newt and Leo poked their faces out of Pidge’s hair, looking for what she was so excited about.

“Wow, calm down there Pidgeon,” Matt said, trying to keep his sister from lifting off the ground. 

“Well, you could say it was these two handsome boys” Keith smirked, throwing an arm around James’ and Lance’s neck, pulling their faces down next to his, almost squishing poor Cosmo, who teleported to Shiro for safety. All three were wearing matching grins.

There was a chorus of what, coming mainly from Pidge, Adam and Veronica, except for, Ina, who James had already been friends with, Nadia and Ryan, who knew because of the video, and the Alteans who didn’t think it was that big of a deal. Keith decided that now, before the questions started, was the perfect time to make his move and chose James who selected dare.

“I dare you to tell the story of how we got together” Keith said, looking up at James from where he was settled in his lap, legs thrown overtop of Lance’s.

With a sigh James began to tell the tale. “It’s kind of embarrassing, but long story short, it all started with Lance and me helplessly pining after one Keith Kogane. After a while we made acquaintance, started bonding over our mutual crush on Keith and at some point started dating”. James took a breath before he continued. “Now around that time, Keith started to notice these two, not too bad looking boys, and through some dumb luck we started dating Keith as well. However we decided to keep the relationship a secret, seeing as Keith wasn’t really comfortable with being out in the open and Lance hadn’t come out to his family yet”.

“So are you all dating each other or what?” Matt asked to try to clarify the boys relationship  
“Yup” Lance confirmed by giving James a peck on the lips.  
“Hey, you can’t give James a kiss without giving me one aswell,” Keith complained with a pout, effectively earning himself a kiss.

The game went on like this for several more minutes, where tales about Earth and space were told, childhood stories were told and secrets revealed. At some point Adam ended up sitting in Shiro's lap, Lance was forced to do some gymnastics in the middle of the circle, Cosmo lay down on Keith, almost crushing him beneath his weight and Allura and Romelle got their hair braided together by the mice. Simply put, everyone was having a good time, until it was once again Alluras turn.

“Lance”

Said boy perked up when Allura said his name.

“Truth or dare” Allura asked.

Lance tilted his head from side to side in a thinking manner.  
“Truth” Lance finally decided.

“Tell them what happened at Omega Shield. And only the truth.” Allura stressed with a serious tone.

Lance visibly paled at the question, looking at Allura pleadingly, silently asking her to change the question. Allura just shook her head in denial. It hurt her to see Lance so scared, but it was time the truth came to light.

The other Paladins just looked confused, all thinking the same thing. ‘What happened?’, ‘What had they missed?’. Going off Lance’s grimace, it must have been something serious.  
As if sensing his distress Cosmo pressed himself against Lance to comfort him. Lance thankfully wrapped his arms around the space wolf’s neck.

“For those who weren’t there, what Allura is talking about is a mission where we had to help the planet's citizens repair a shield meant to protect them from dangerous solar winds. Me and Allura set out in Red and Blue to meld the broken shield parts back together, while Pidge, Hunk and Shiro’s clone worked on repairing the generator. Since Allura was currently focused on freezing the broken parts together, she didn’t notice the electric discharge that was about to hit her. Without thinking, I flew as fast as I could and pushed Blue and Allura out of the way with Red and took the hit myself. I don’t remember much from the hit itself, all I remember is the searing pain as the electricity cursed through me and then-” Lance swallowed hard, tears welling up in his eyes “- black, nothing. I wasn’t for long, maybe a few minutes, seeing as Allura came immediately and healed me. … But I died. I honest to fucking god died”.

No one said a thing, too busy processing the things they just learned. The only things that could be heard was the nervous chittering of the space mice and space caterpillars, as well as the distressed wimpers of both Bae Bae and Cosmo and Lances muffled sobbing.  
Keith and James didn’t hesitate to cuddle Lance and try to calm him down with soft whispers and gentle kisses.

By the time Lance had calmed down enough to stop sobbing, it was already pretty late, so they all decided to head to wherever they were staying for the night.  
Once Lance returned home, with Shiro, Keith, James and Hunk in tow, the McClain household with all it’s occupants decided to turn the evening into an impromptu cuddle session with soft blankets, Hunk’s freshly baked cookies and lots of extra sweet hot chocolate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not entirely happy with this chapter.  
> Sorry some of the characters got barly any interactions or none at all.
> 
> Anaways, for the next chapter we get a glimpse of the past.  
> Till then bye!


	6. A (g)lance of the past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final chapter of this Fanfic!  
> Enjoy :D

“Lance”

Said boy just answered with a noise that was something between a whine and a grunt.

“I thought you wanted to study for the test that's coming up?” Keith asked.

“Don’t remind me,” Lance grumbled out, throwing his right arm over his eyes, as if to block out the world.

James, Keith and Lance were currently in Keith’s room, seeing as he was the only one without a roommate, where they had originally planned to do some studying but ended up watching something on James’ phone instead, while cuddling on the bed. Lance being the body pillow for Keith to rest his head on and James spooning Keith from behind.

“Well since Keith already reminded you of it, we may as well start,” James said, disentangling himself from Keith.

Lance let out a dramatic groan but sat up, pulling the books he would need out of his discarded bag.

“So where is it that you were having problems?” Keith questioned Lance, ready to help his boyfriend to the best of his abilities. It wasn’t like Lance was dumb, and Keith knew this, but his ADHD made it hard for Lance to concentrate sometimes. The teachers weren’t helping either by calling him out in front of the whole class when he got distracted or making him feel stupid when he didn’t get the right answer. But Keith and James tried to be there for him as best as they could, not to mention Hunk who played a huge role in Lance’s life, not only as a support role but also as his best friend.

‘Speaking of Hunk’ Keith thought to himself. 

“Have you actually ever told Hunk, Lance?” Keith questioned, rather out of the blue for the other two occupants of the room. James looked up from where he was leaning over his textbook with a questioning tilt to his head when Keith spoke up.

“Told him what?” Lance questioned in return, not quite following what the other boy was saying.

“Did you ever come out to Hunk?” Keith clarified.

“No I haven’t told him yet,” Lance answered sheepishly, turning his head away slightly guilty. “And my family neither,” he added as an afterthought. Why did Lance feel guilty? Because he promised James and Keith months ago that he would come out to at least Hunk. However, he chickened out at the last moment and deflected the subject with something else entirely. Hunk, bless his soul, never asked Lance about it afterwards, even though he could tell Lance wanted to say something else. 

“You know you don’t have to if you feel uncomfortable,” James was quick to reassure him.

“I know, and I want to, I just …” Lance hesitated, absentmindedly tapping his pencil against his book. “I just- it sounds stupid, I just get all these second thoughts and doubts when I try to tell someone and then suddenly I’m too afraid to do it even though I know they would except me and-” Lance’s nervous rambling was unexpectatly cut off by Keith kissing him on the lips.

James snickered at the adorably perplexed expression on Lance’s face.

All the while, Keith lifted Lance’s chin gently with his hand to make sure Lance was looking him in his eyes and said, “It‘s not stupid, you’re not stupid, because it’s perfectly normal to feel this way. I was afraid too when I told Shiro I was gay and at that point I already knew he wouldn’t have a problem with it, seeing as he was gay aswell,” Keith repriminaded Lance.

“Wow,” James commented, “I think that’s the most I’ve heard you talk today.

“Shut up James, you’re ruining the moment,” Keith grumbled out with a fond undertone in his voice.

“Aww, is the kitten angry?” James cooed teasingly.

“I’m not a kitten!”

“Yes you are Keith,” Lance butted in, “ there’s no denying it. You’re an adorable, angry, fluffy little kitten”.

“For the last time, I’m not a kitten,” Keith pouted, tackling a grinning Lance to bed, attacking the boy beneath him with mercyless tickles, causing Lance to laugh out loud kicking his legs in a vain attempt to shake Keith off. 

James doubled over from laughing so hard at the display in front of him, clutching his sides from the force of it, before deciding to come to Lance’s rescue by tickling Keith in retaliation. Their studies lying, once again forgotten, strewn across the bed and floor.

~time skip~

No, no, no nonononono, this was not happening. This is just a bad dream and every moment now he would wake up in the bed of his shared dorm room and Hunk would ask him if everything was alright, and he would answer that yes, everything was okay, it was just a nightmare, nothing worrisome. Lance pinched himself as if to prove to himself that this wasn’t real. When he felt a sharp pain in his arm however, he knew that this was real, that it was really happening and was not just a bad dream he could wake up from and everything would be alright.

Wide eyed and shocked, everyone was staring up at the message being displayed on the screens, shocked silence filling the room. The students were all in the cafeteria for dinner when the message came. On the screen was written in bold letters:

**Kerberos Mission failed. All members of the crew presumed to be dead.**

Panicked, Lance shared a meaningful glance across the hall, both thinking the same thing, … Keith. Keith needed them and he needed them now.

Without a second's hesitation, the two boys jumped up from their respective tables, bolting out of the cafeteria in search for Keith. Sure, Lance had Adam to worry about too, but Adam was an adult, he could handle himself. Moreover, Adam had Veronica to comfort himself, while Keith had only himself.

In the end, it didn’t take them long to find him. Keith was lying on the ground, in one of the more rarely used hallways near the lunch hall, where he crumpled to the floor when he heard the message, from when he was presumably on his way to dinner. 

When James and Lance first tried to approach Keith’s crumpled form, he lashed out at them with uncontained, blind rage. They didn’t let themselves be driven away by Keith. They knew him well enough to know that this was normal. Keith lashing out meant that it wasn’t as bad as it first seemed, it could have been way worse. When James finally managed to get a hold of his boyfriend by pinning his arms to his side in a fierce hug, Keith finally broke down into heavy sobs that shook his whole body with their force. Said boy desperately wrapped his arms around James, burying his face in James’ shoulder. 

Lance hugged Keith from behind, squishing his cheek between the other boys shoulder blades in silent comfort. Lance and James shared a glance over Keith’s shoulder, it broke both of their hearts to see Keith like this, but all they could do right now was to just be there.

For a long while they just sat there crying for their loss. What felt like hours later, Keith tired himself out enough to apologise for lashing and they moved for the safety of Keith’s dorm. Eventually, Lance had to reluctantly go back to his own dorm, with a half assed excuse for suddenly leaving as to not worry Hunk further, while James stayed with Keith for the night, unwilling to leave him alone.

After this event it didn’t get better. Keith got into more and more fights as time passed by,his anger was uncontrolled and constantly bubbling way too close to the surface, no matter how hard Lance and James tried to calm him down. Of course, Keith told them about his theory how he didn’t believe that Shiro was really dead, they believed him and tried to help to the best of their abilities. The question was … how much could they actually do? They were just to sixteen year olds and seventeen year old.

Then one fateful morning, the dreaded message came. Cadet Keith Kogane was kicked out of the space program after getting in a fight with Commander Iverson. Naturally, James and Lance were devastated, because Keith was missing and no one knew where he was. He didn’t answer any of the messages they sent and didn’t pick up any calls. He could very well be dead and they would never know.

Lance became a fighter pilot. It was a bittersweet moment, since the only reason he even got the spot was that Keith dropped out and Commander Iverson made sure to remind at every opportunity. It was a constant reminder of what- of who they had lost and the wound remained fresh and bleeding. On some days James really felt like following Keith’s example and just punch Iverson for making Lance feel so worthless, for making his brilliant and wonderful boyfriend feel so worthless. But no matter how much he wanted to, James knew he couldn’t do it, because Lance needed him now more than ever and he needed Lance. They needed each other to remind them that someday they will be okay again, that someday the pain would fade to a dull throb in the back of their heads.

It was a normal morning for James. He went to the cafeteria for some coffee and breakfast before another painful day full off lessons and reminders of Keith’s disappearance. Since it was still relatively early, there weren’t many students awake and as far as James could see, Lance wasn’t there yet. It wasn’t unusual for him to be up a little late, afterall he liked his ‘beauty sleep’ as Lance liked to call it. 

That's when Ina tapped him hesitantly on the shoulder, showing him something on her phone screen. James rubbed his eyes, as to make sure he was seeing right, because there on the phone screen was something James hoped to never see:

**Three Galaxy Garrison Cadets missing:**

Pidge Gunderson, Hunk Garret, ... Lance McClain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finish! Dramatic end, I know. Sorry for the short chapter by the way, but it didn't feel right to do more, hope you enjoyed it anyways.
> 
> ~pauses~
> 
> I can't believe if finished my first fanfiction. But don't worry, not all hope is lost, becasue I do plan to write more. And who knows, maybe if already started something.


End file.
